The following section contains tips about troubleshooting OS X and iBooks on an Airport network. The aim of this section is to help teachers and students keep their computer running. If you do not feel comfortable doing any of these items, please see your friendly neighborhood techie. These tips are not exactly Apple endorsed, they are based on my experience here at school. If you really need to find a solution to a problem, try Apple's support pages.
| Problem |
Solution
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| Power Problems
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| 1. The computer doesn't start up. Black screen, no blinking sleep light, no sound. |
Or, the computer won't wake up.
Plug it in. make sure the adapter has power and try to turn it on. Also, check to see if the caps lock key lights up. If it does you may be stuck in the "sleep of death" also, the computer may be very hot. Hold the power button down until the caps lock key light goes off, give it a couple of seconds and try to start it up again. |
| 2. The computer runs out of battery very quickly and shuts down without warning. |
The charger may not have been plugged in all the way, so the computer didn't charge - try again. Check the battery level when first unplugging. Reset the power manager by turning off the computer and removing the battery. Hold down the shift, control, option and power keys for 5 seconds. Wait 5 seconds and put the battery back in and power it up. Recharge the battery and see what happens. If it still isn't working right, swap the battery with a machine that works. If your machine now works, it is a bad battery. The battery may be replaced under warranty if it is defective, you need to have the battery to get a new battery. |
| 3. The computer is extremely hot. |
The machine was set to shut down and then the lid was closed before it could shut down and it go stuck in the "sleep of death." Shut the machine off, let it cool off and try again. |
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4. The computer won't sleep when the lid is shut. |
The keyboard is probably not seated correctly, reseat the keyboard and try again. |
| Printing |
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| 1. Can't see the printers |
You need to open Printer Setup Utility and add printers. |
| 2. Don't have the right printer driver. |
You need to find out what model printer you have, if it isn't already listed in the list in the Printer Setup Utility, then you need to install a printer. The best place to get printer drivers for OS X is from the printer company's web site. |
| 3. Won't print. I try to print but it never comes out anywhere and I've tried several printers. |
Check your Printer Setup Utility. Double click on the printer and look to see if it says printing stopped or error. Usually you just have to delete the old print jobs and restart the print queue to get things going again. |
| 4. Won't print, printer says it is printing, nothing ever comes out and the Printer Setup Utility is fine.
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Check to see if anybody else is having a problem printing to the same printer. If the printer is fine, you may have a corrupt font, try a different font.
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| Network
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| 1. Can't print, can't get on the internet, can't get email, etc. |
No Network access. Check to see if you airport indicator is black and that you are on the network. If not, get connected to the network. |
| 2. I'm on the network and I can see the internal servers, printers, etc. but I can't get on the internet. |
No valid IP address. Open System preferences and hit the Network pane. If the DHCP address for your Airport connection is 169.254.xxx.xxx then you do not have a vaild IP address. Try shutting your computer off, wait 10 sec. and start it back up. |
| 3. Been there, done that, still no go. |
Check out your nearest Airport base station - are the lights blinking? What lights? Plug it in. The center light should be solid, the other 2 lights should blink randomly. |
| 4. Is is live, or is it Memorex? |
Open your airport admin utility, it should automatically scan the network and show you all the base stations. If a base station is showing up twice, reset it. If a base station isn't showing up at all, reset it. If none of this has gotten you onto the Internet, check with your system admin. |
Hardware Problems
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| 1. Keyboard is giving me weird characters |
Somebody flipped it into another keyboard. Go to the international system preferences and set it back to US. |
| 2. Trackpad is jumpy or slow. |
Static will sometimes futz out the trackpad, put the computer to sleep for a few seconds and wake it back up. Remember to only use 1 finger on the trackpad. Also, really dry hands or really sweaty hands will make the trackpad act weird. |
| 3. Dark Screen |
Adjust the tilt of the screen, adjust the brightness of the screen. |
| 4. Jammed CD |
If holding down the F12 key does eject your CD, try turning off your computer and starting it back up with the mouse or trackpad button held down. Remember, with slot load CDs, you can only use normal size CDs. |
| 5. Hooked a projector up, but can't see anything. |
Put the computer to sleep and wake it back up. Open the displays system preferences and check the settings. With Macbooks, turn on Mirroring in the display prefs. Sometimes you need to shut the computer off and then turn it on again for it to see the projector.
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| Software Problems
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| 1. Dead slow startup, slow operation in general.
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Start up in "safe mode" (hold the shift key down) and let it crank, then restart as normal. Run Disk Utility and run disk first aid and repair permissions. Do not repair permissions on an MLTI machine. On an MLTI machine you can run several processes that may improve the general "snappyness" of the machine. Go to the 1to1 prefs in System Preferences and click on the Maintenance tab. Click the button labeled "Perform scheduled system mainenance tasks now."
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| 2. Machine is totally jammed, nothing is working.
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Do the "3 fingered salute" hit the control, apple and power buttons and restart the computer.
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| 3. A program seems to stop working.
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Force quit the application by hitting option-apple and esc keys.
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| 4. Generally weird acting program, quits unexpectedly.
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Check to see if you can log in as another user and use the program. If the program doesn't work right as another user then reinstall the program. If it does work correctly then it is probably a corrupt preference file in your user preferences. In OS X the preferences all end in .plist. Log in as your normal self and do a search on .plist. Find the file that has the name of your application in it and trash it. Log out, log back in and try the program.
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